Arches Cover Papers

Mouldmade in France specifically for printmaking and publishing, Arches Cover has a pronounced grain, two watermarks, and two natural deckle edges. It works beautifully for any printmaking process, or as a drawing surface.

Minimum Order — If our price on a paper is $6.99 or less, a minimum order of 10 sheets of paper is required. Your selection may be assorted to meet this requirement. If our price is $7.00 or more, papers may be ordered per sheet.

There will be additional handling charges or the item may be limited to certain shipping methods.

I've used this paper for nearly two decades and wouldn't think of using anything else for my editions, with the exception of a few special papers I've used for one or two of my editions. There have only been two notable problems over the years, one attributable to the paper itself and one to the handling and distribution of it. I create etchings and then hand paint each one with transparent watercolor. Generally the Arches Cover takes the paint beautifully and can be blended and lifted with ease. The first problem occurred when a batch of the Arches Cover I was using did not allow me to easily blend the paint, but created an instant staining situation which prevented the paint from being blended or lifted. It just stained the paper deeply. I had to throw out all the paper with that problem and now, whenever I receive a new batch of paper, I test one corner on the back with transparent, non-staining watercolor to see if I can immediately lift it off. I never knew if that was a sizing issue or what, but I haven't run into it since then and that's been over a year ago.

The second problem was really an annoyance more than anything. I just received 25 sheets of Arches Cover from Dick Blick, and for whatever reason someone somewhere along the line decided to write a series of 5 numbers on multiple corners, both front and back of each sheet in pencil, some quite dark. I spent about an hour with a draftsman's eraser pad removing the numbers...arrrgghh! I needed the paper so it would have been inconvenient to return it, although Dick Blick was perfectly willing to do that and were very apologetic. They were as mystified as I was as to who and why someone would do that.

Internal and surface sizing makes it a printmaking paper, but the same sizing allows me to use it for gouache washes that are as delicate as watercolor. It's like painting with colored light. The heavy weight keeps buckling to a minimum. I also use it as a drawing media with wax. Texture is pretty heavy. That's a good thing in my case. Black is a part of the fiber - not pigment or dye, so it is permanent. Unfortunately it is not easy to find and unlike other Arches paper, it does not come in rolls.

As one of the leading paper mills in the world, Arches offers several high quality printmaking sheets to artists for a variety
of printing and drawing techniques and applications. See how to evaluate a sheet of paper to make sure it will suit your needs.

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